Staff Reports
The Bartholomew County Jail’s REC (Residents Encounter Christ) program, has received a $3,500 Regional and Local Impact grant from the Indiana Sheriff’s Association.
Bartholomew County Sheriff Matthew A. Myers accepted the check from ISA Director Stephen P. Luce while they were attending the National Sheriff’s Association’s annual conference in Louisville, KY, earlier this week.
REC is a three-day experience where teams of trained Christian volunteers come into BCJ to minister to residents. All supplies and equipment are provided by and set up by the REC community. Men and women’s weekends are held separately. The teams usually consist of around 40 members. If space and numbers allow, a REC weekend typically ministers to about 50 inmates.
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Most of the weekend involves 13 talks and small group discussions to learn how to apply the material to their lives.
The discussions following the talks allow for bonds to form and for the volunteers to help residents move toward a changed life. This is followed by a service where residents are invited to give their lives to Jesus Christ to transform their lives.
REC weekends culminate with a closing ceremony where the residents are given the opportunity to share their testimony of how their lives are changing.
Myers attended the national conference following his appointment to the National Sheriff’s Association’s Homeland Security Committee earlier this year. The HSC is co-chaired by Sheriff Michael Chapman, Loudoun County, Virginia and Sheriff Justin Smith, Larimer County, Colorado.
The National Sheriffs’ Association is a non-profit organization dedicated to raising the level of professionalism among those in the law enforcement field and helps shape national policy on critical criminal justice and homeland security issues important to the nation’s sheriffs, deputies and police in Congress, courts and the federal government.
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Residents Encounter Christ is an inter denominational Christian ministry to prisoners. It is a variation of Cursillo, a short informal spiritual retreat developed in Spain modified for the prison environment.
The program began in the late 1960s in a county jail in Lawrence, Massachusetts, where three Franciscan priests offered a retreat for inmates.
Generally speaking, a team of about 30 Christian men and women from different denominational backgrounds, both lay and clergy, enter the prison to share three days of Christian community. After the initial retreat is held at a prison, monthly follow-ups are made to encourage and support the residents in their spiritual growth and Christian community.
Source: Residents Encounter Christ website.
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The New Day Residents Encounter Christ Ministry is headquartered at 3129 25th St., Suite 369, in Columbus.
For more information online, go to newdayrec.org
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